Tour Match

Key gives selectors an Ashes nudge with calculated century

At a time of crisis, England needed something reassuring yesterday and they found it in the avuncular shape of Rob Key. The Kent batsman's first hundred of the summer was something to slump into gratefully, like a comfy old sofa, a chance to escape a hostile world of injured England captains and creeping Ashes pessimism.

Key's unbeaten 128, which occupied all but three overs of the day, was a serene addition to a tranquil summer's day, a batsman settling into familiar surroundings. The pitch was flat, as he had predicted it would be, and he accepted the bounty with equilibrium. As a reminder to the England selectors that he has not given up hope of an Ashes tour, there were no histrionics, no brusque dismissal of Pakistan's Test attack, just a gentle accumulation, an innings that hummed along with the coolers of the ice-cream van.

Pakistan fielded their likely Test attack, in the absence of Shoaib Akhtar and Rana Naved-ul-Hasan. Over the past two sessions, they found enough reverse swing to ensure that Key could take no liberties. For Bob Woolmer, their coach, it was a reminder of Kent days of yore. "This is the sort of workout we need before the Lord's Test," he said. "There used to be pitches here that virtually guaranteed a hundred if you got in," he said. "Things haven't changed all that much."

Key should have been dismissed in the last over before lunch, a regulation catch off Mohammad Asif to the wicketkeeper which Kamran Akmal put down, and so added bruised pride to the bruised left index finger suffered in only the fifth over of the day. Akmal did not reappear after lunch. Pakistan, who do not have a reserve keeper on tour but have Zulqarnain Haider on standby in Pakistan, are unconcerned. "He will be fit," said Woolmer. Faisal Iqbal deputised competently enough in the meantime.

Key reached his hundred with the easiest of his 16 boundaries, a gentle half-volley delivered from around the wicket by Abdul Razzaq, and flicked gratefully through midwicket. But no amount of runs could make him a contender for the Pakistan Test series. A major shoulder reconstruction in the winter has left him with the throwing arm of a Page 3 girl. When he dug out a yorker from Asif just before lunch, and lobbed the ball towards the slips, it was one of his longer efforts of the season.

The Australians claimed to have been impressed by Key on the last Ashes tour four years ago - although Australians advocating English batsmen for selection should always be regarded with suspicion. The last of his 15 Tests, though, came early last year in South Africa and others, notably Alastair Cook but also Paul Collingwood and Ian Bell, have since gained precedence.

A second-wicket stand of 160 between Key and Bell was England A's bedrock. Bell's careful 74 ended with an edge to the stand-in wicketkeeper. Cook failed to gain a psychological advantage before the first Test when he fell cheaply. But, compared to England A's banishing of Sri Lanka on a Worcester greentop in the spring, it was all a different world.

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